I didn't really follow the news in the old days, and never participated in the Bioware forums - were they themselves ever really passionate about (RPG) gaming? To me they always seemed more like passionate entrepreneurs. Passionate about building a great company (and they found passionate developers to make this a reality) more than passionate about making games. But maybe you guys have a different perspective?

Originally Posted by GhanBuriGhan
were they themselves ever really passionate about (RPG) gaming?

I think so, at least Ray.. He hang out quite a lot on comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.rpg in the '90's, remember speaking to him there a few times. He always came off like someone who was quite passionate about RPG's, and he also listened to input / suggestions from the fans (BG period).

-- "Since you are sharing your opinion with others you might give a false impression to those who haven't played the game yet." zahratustra shares his view why i'm not entitled to have an opinion on RPGwatch

I don't get why you thought I outlined a "conspiracy". You, on the other hand, did seem to theorize a conspiracy with your earlier comment, "when they (voluntarily) sold BioWare to Elevation Partners - a private equity firm co-founded by Ricciatello, I'm pretty sure they knew where it was going."

As to the flurry of announcements over the past few days, I'm glad you agree with my comment that these were seeking to assure everyone of business as usual. As to your point that this is what you would have done, no problem. Certainly something was needed to fill in the glaring void created by the failure to announce a successor.

To me these announcements felt rushed, and to some extent undercut the very assurance they were intended to generate as a result. Muzyka said he had been planning the transition for six months, but the flurry of a bunch of game announcements at the least minute hardly seems like the result of a plan six months in the making. Staged announcements over a period of weeks would have generated a stronger sense of long term continuity as compared to last minute timing. Moreover, the naming of a successor concurrently with announcing the docs' retirement would be an expected part of any good plan for long term stability and continuity.

Personally, I don't believe that their leacving was intended to do anything with Bioware directly.

But apart from that I fear that Bioware will indeed be reduced (in)to a mere brand for EA … Like Origin, like Westwood etc. …

I rather believe that their leaving has nothing to do with what's going on - it was long planned, and it is executed now (their leaving, I mean), that's how I see it.

-- “ Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius – and a lot of courage – to move in the opposite direction.“ (E.F.Schumacher, Economist, Source)

Should pretty much be business as usual, which is to also say, it is now blatantly obvious that they basically lied about it being business as usual for the last year or two. No surprises, and definitely not meaning to single the BioDocs out - plenty of guys sell out, it's pretty much what this system gets you. I just hope the gaming press can learn to read between the damn lines at some point. We can't be publishers' bitches forever. We can like the games and still say what's on our minds.

Leadership is an important aspect of a successful enterprise. It's important to give employees a sense of security and direction. And leadership is the key to give the enterprise, itself, focus and coordination, so that planned goals can be accomplished by the teamwork of individuals in the enterprise, working together as a single entity.

A major aspect of leadership is planning for a transition in leadership, as is expected to happen at some point in every enterprise. It's a basic element of every leadership manual. Good leaders are always planning for the day when they will intentionally or unintentionally depart, thus providing for the enterprise to continue and grow even though they are gone. In particular, good leaders typically groom one or more promising individuals to fill their role upon their expected or unexpected departure.

The failure of the docs to groom a successor is a problem that must now be addressed if the enterprise is to grow and flourish. If the docs' departure was indeed a long planned event as you believe, the docs' failure to groom one or more successors becomes an even bigger issue. A leaderless enterprise is comparable to a rudderless ship. It's hard to imagine that the docs had a long term plan to leave their ship in such a state.

Then again, could be that even if Muzyka and Zeschuk did have a long term plan to abandon ship, the need for next generation leadership was simply another of those surprises they seemed to keep encountering…

A Wired blog post has an interesting take on timing of the docs' retirement, suggesting a possible connection to vesting of a deferred equity payout from EA's acquisition of BioWare, as follows:

Electronic Arts acquired BioWare in October 2007. EA noted at the time that it would pay an additional $155 million in equity to “certain employees” of the company, subject to “time-based… vesting criteria.” Zeschuk and Muzyka’s concurrent departures come almost exactly five years after the acquisition.